A valve assembly for an internal combustion engine generally includes a valve spring and a valve seal having a retainer. Before the valve spring and the retainer fit into place, a valve seal is usually positioned over a valve stem. Valve stem seals control the amount of oil allowed between a valve stem and a valve stem guide. The seal functions in the manner of a positive seal or umbrella seal to prevent oil from flowing down the valve stem into the combustion chamber. The spring, which normally acts to keep the valve closed, is held in place by an individual retainer that is secured onto the valve stem. Such retainers typically prevent the valve spring from wearing into the engine head surface. A rocker cover gasket is separately provided to further insure against lubricant flowing into the combustion chamber. However, individual valve stem seal assemblies and rocker cover gaskets are undesirable due to increased assembly time and increased likelihood of manufacturing nonconformaties.
Another known type of valve seal assembly includes a rocker cover sealing member having coil seal members and bolt seal members connected together in series. The coil seal members are positioned on the outermost ends of the rocker cover sealing member and are arranged in a straight line in series on a single blank to correspond to ignition coil mounting holes. A narrow connection member secures the coil seal members together. However, this type of known rocker cover sealing member is undesirable as there is no means for compensating for self-alignment and tolerance problems. Further, there is no mechanism for selective removal of individual valve stem seals in the event of wear or failure of an individual valve stem seal.
Accordingly, there exists a need for an improved combination of a rocker cover gasket having integral valve stem seals. More particularly, there exists a need for a rocker cover gasket having multiple integral valve stem seals that is easy to produce, reduces the number of engine components, and makes the components that are used easier to handle and assemble with respect to a particular engine head configuration.